Monday, 5 September 2016

#MondayMusing with Guest Author: Lyn G. Farrell

Today it brings me great pleasure to welcome Lyn. G Farrell to the blog. I am not too shy to admit I was over the moon when she agreed to answer my questions, you see I adore her debut novel The Wacky Man. It is a book that I would urge everybody to read. You can see my thoughts on it here.

My new shrink asks me, 'What things do you remember about being very young?' It's like looking into a murky river, I say. Memories flash near the surface like fish coming up for flies. The past peeps out, startles me, and then is gone...

Amanda secludes herself in her bedroom, no longer willing to face the outside world. Gradually, she pieces together the story of her life: her brothers have had to abandon her, her mother scarcely talks to her, and the Wacky Man could return any day to burn the house down. Just like he promised. As her family disintegrates, Amanda hopes for a better future, a way out from the violence and fear that has consumed her childhood. But can she cling to her sanity, before insanity itself is her only means of escape?

Without further ado, I shall hand over to Lyn. Welcome to the blog and thank you so much for taking the time.

1)Could
you tell us a bit about yourself?

You could describe me as a ‘late
bloomer’. As a former chronic truant due to my situation at home, I lived in an
isolated limbo for a long time, though I read anything I could lay my hands on
and watched mammoth amounts of American black and white melodrama in the
afternoons. I returned to education at nineteen and university at twenty three,
studied for my Masters at thirty five, joined a band at thirty seven, had my
first novel published at forty seven and will (hopefully) pass my driving test
at forty eight. My motto is ‘It’s never too late’ J

My younger life was all about
survival but nowadays it’s about creativity and caring. I like to campaign for
human rights and animal welfare and I’m addicted to learning (FutureLearn is
the most incredible, free resource for anyone who wants to study a plethora of
subjects from journalism to song writing) and some of my favourite things
include world cinema, reading, growing my own tomatoes and chillies, and
learning to drive (yes, really, I love it).

2)As you know I loved your novel. Could you tell
us a bit about The Wacky Man, for those who haven’t read it yet?

Thanks so much for your kind
words and so pleased you liked it. The Wacky Man is about Amanda, an
intelligent, articulate teenager, who is struggling to cope with the violence
and abuse she has suffered at the hands of her father. She is raw and angry and
in desperate need and the reader finds themselves sitting with her as she tells
her story.

3)Which
writers do you admire?

I love so many writers that I
could write a list that filled a book! I like a lot of genres, from sci fi to
literary, love classic or contemporary fiction, and I like to read
translated fiction (trying to read my way around the world as it were). So when
I’m asked this question, I just have to write down the authors that spring to
mind first. It would be easier to photograph my bookshelves and even that
wouldn’t show the countless books I’ve given away after reading!

I would love to have the
imaginative power to write fiction similar to that I loved as a child. Some of
my favourite childhood books - Watership Down, The Water Babies, The Golden
Goblet, Huckleberry Finn and the Mr Men.

It would have to be ‘Woman on the
Edge of Time’ by Marge Piercy. This had such a powerful impact on me as a young
teenager and raises lots of questions about society and what it is to be male
or female. It really was a pivotal book for me and I’ve often bought this to
give away as a present. I really recommend it.

5)Are
you writing currently, if so is there something you can tell us about that?

I’m preparing for my second novel
– lots of note making and research. It’s about the healing power of unusual
friendship so it’s a very different feel to my first book. Though it will also
focus on the way life can be derailed, it’s looking at it from the opposite,
healing, side of the experience.

6)How
important is the cover of a book in your opinion?

I’d never thought of this in any
depth until I saw the amount of interest the cover to my novel generated. It
made me realise the impact it was having and I then thought about my own ‘cover’
behaviour. I am often put off by pastel coloured covers with swirly writing and
I think I’m missing some absolute gems because of the cover design. A bold
cover that leaps out but doesn’t fully explain itself draws me in so I’d say it’s
absolutely crucial. I struck gold with my cover designer.

7)What
made you become a writer?

I had the Wacky Man in my head
since I was about thirty. I thought if I ignored it, it would go away but it
just bubbled away until I had to get it written down. I sometimes struggle to
see myself as a ‘writer’ because the novel took me ten years to write (about ¾
of that just learning how to write – on reflection a creative writing course
would have saved me lots of grey hair and stress). I have another novel
‘bubbling away’ now in the back of my mind but I am finding that it’s a slow
process once again. I hope it won’t take me another ten years but who knows?

8)The
themes in The Wacky Man are dark and presented in a bold way that you can’t shy
away from but also with a bit of humour in places, did you intend it to shock?

I never intended it to shock, no.
I wanted people to actually feel the life that Amanda was living, that
so many battered kids have to face, and that was the driving force behind the
way I wrote. I knew it would be difficult for people to read but felt that a
battered child has as much right in fiction as any other character.

I understand that many people who
haven’t experienced abuse in childhood will find this a shocking novel and that
many want different stories to the one I wrote but I would hope they can see
why it was written (imagine surviving such a childhood when you read this
novel). I wrote The Wacky Man from experience, with care and purpose and with
every ounce of skill I possess. I’ve seen other books with tough subjects
called misery fiction, misery lit or misery porn and I find that a truly
disappointing and dismissive label. It’s a way of reducing some writing into a
perceived ‘lesser’ or ‘not worthy’ form.

I’m really heartened by the fact
that so many reviewers, including your good self, have described it as ‘tough
subject, beautiful writing’ because I had two aims with this novel: to raise
awareness about battered children and to write the most beautiful fiction I was
capable of. I am overwhelmed that the vast majority of readers so far saw what
I was trying to do with The Wacky Man.

9)What
are your writing habits and space like?

I tend to have periods where I
can nothing but write followed by times when I’ll do anything but write. My
writing habits of late have been rather ill disciplined because I’ve become
addicted to ‘The Good Wife’ and there are still about five seasons to get
through! I also have to write around my full time job so my productivity is
decided by how long or challenging the work day has been. I’m lucky enough to
work at home at least half of the week which gives me extra time and even if
I’m not writing I will be making notes, jotting down ideas or researching and
reading so I’m never completely removed from the process.

I have a room where I write which
sounds glamorous but actually it’s just my bedroom. It’s a large room but I
have everything squashed in there. Bed, wardrobes, desk, computer, bookshelves,
cross trainer! My desk is by the window so my view is of one of the car parks
to my block of flats which luckily isn’t terribly busy in the day, otherwise
I’d be more distracted.

10)What is the
strangest thing you have ever had to research online for your writing?

Recently it would be the ‘Sky
Burial’ – in parts of Tibet the dead are cut up and left out for the vultures
to eat. I felt a bit ‘funny’ at this ‘funeral practice’ compared to our own
prayers and coffins but when I looked at it in context it makes perfect sense. The mountainous
ground is far too hard to bury people in and vultures in Buddhist culture are
important because they eat meat but never kill so they’re seen as a force for
good. Worms eat our dead anyway – it’s just more hidden from us! I think this
Tibetan burial practice is a great example of how, when you examine something
deeply, it stops seeming strange or even sinister sounding and becomes
something human and peaceful.

11)Could you tell us something about you that
people wouldn’t necessary know?

I sing. I have always loved
singing but far too shy to sing in public. I finally plucked up courage to join
an evening class and went on to do open mics and even join a local band – and
all of this in my late thirties. I found performing too anxiety provoking so
gave it up for a few years but have just got back into singing at a local music
night that I’m running with a friend. I find singing taps into a very different
part of me than the writing does, but I love it just as much.

Lyn G Farrell grew up in Lancashire where she would have gone to school if things had been different. She studied Psychology as an undergraduate at the University of Leeds, later gaining a PGCET and most recently, a Masters in ICT and Education. Having worked in a number of IT and teaching roles, she is currently an online tutor in the School of Education at Leeds Beckett University.

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About Me

A long term love affair with books started when I was a small child. It started with The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle, and has moved on since then. To me a book will always be made of paper. Reading a book is an experience, the smell of the book, the feel of it and the wonderful places and things that you can experience between those pages.